rising young ministers of the Gospel.[2] It amused her to invite them to sign documents, composed in playful imitation of legal contracts, binding themselves 'to come and preach at Crassier as often as she required, without waiting to be solicited, pressed, or entreated, seeing that the greatest of their pleasures was to oblige her on every possible occasion.' Her female friends, hearing of this, wrote to her expressing their disapproval, and strongly advising her to turn the preachers out of the house as soon as they had finished their sermons; but there is no evidence that she acted on their advice.

THE SPIRES OF ST. FRANÇOIS, LAUSANNE

Visiting Lausanne, she extended the circle of her admirers. Her bright intelligence enabled her to shine as a member of a certain Société du Printemps, and also of a certain Académie des Eaux—a debating club given to the discussion of such problems as 'Does an element of mystery really make love more agreeable?' or 'Can there be friendship between a man and a woman in the same sense as between two women or two men?' Her conduct in this connection was such that her friends warned her that her desire to make herself agreeable to young men was too clearly advertised; but it does not appear that the warning made any impression on her. At all events, she was very successful in making herself agreeable to Gibbon, then a lad about eighteen years of age. 'Saw Mademoiselle Curchod. Omnia vincit amor, et nos cedamus amori,' is one of the early entries in his diary; and we have a picture of Gibbon, at about the same date, from Mademoiselle Curchod's own pen. In middle age—as we can see from his portraits—he was an ugly, ungainly, podgy little man; but it is not thus that he appears in the portrait drawn by the woman who loved him.

'He has beautiful hair,' Mademoiselle Curchod writes, 'a pretty hand, and the air of a man of rank. His face is so intellectual and strange that I know no one like him. It has so much expression that one is always finding something new in it. His gestures are so appropriate that they add much to his speech. In a word, he has one of those extraordinary faces that one never tires of trying to depict. He knows the respect that is due to women. His courtesy is easy without verging on familiarity. He dances moderately well.'

So these two naturally—and rightly and properly—fell in love; they must have seemed each other's ideal complements, if ever lovers were. But they were not to marry. The story of their attachment, their separation, and their subsequent Platonic friendship is one of the romances of literature. Gibbon himself has told the story in one of the most frequently quoted passages of his autobiography. His version of it is inexact and misleading; but it must be quoted, if only in order that it may be criticized:

'I need not blush,' he writes, 'at recollecting the object of my choice; and though my love was disappointed of success, I am rather proud that I was once capable of feeling such a pure and exalted sentiment. The personal attractions of Mademoiselle Susan Curchod were embellished by the virtues and talents of the mind. Her fortune was humble, but her family was respectable. Her mother, a native of France, had preferred her religion to her country. The profession of her father did not extinguish the moderation and philosophy of his temper, and he lived content with a small salary and laborious duty in the obscure lot of minister of Crassy, in the mountains that separate the Pays de Vaud from the county of Burgundy. In the solitude of a sequestered village he bestowed a liberal, and even learned, education on his only daughter. She surpassed his hopes by her proficiency in the sciences and languages; and in her short visits to some relations at Lausanne, the wit, the beauty, and erudition of Mademoiselle Curchod were the theme of universal applause. The report of such a prodigy awakened my curiosity; I saw and loved. I found her learned without pedantry, lively in conversation, pure in sentiment, and elegant in manners; and the first sudden emotion was fortified by the habits and knowledge of a more familiar acquaintance. She permitted me to make two or three visits at her father's house. I passed some happy days there, in the mountains of Burgundy, and her parents honourably encouraged the connection. In a calm retirement the gay vanity of youth no longer fluttered in her bosom, and I might presume to hope that I had made some impression on a virtuous heart. At Crassy and Lausanne I indulged my dream of felicity; but on my return to England I soon discovered that my father would not hear of this strange alliance, and that, without his consent, I was myself destitute and helpless. After a painful struggle I yielded to my fate; I sighed as a lover, I obeyed as a son; my wound was insensibly healed by time, absence, and the habits of a new life. My cure was accelerated by a faithful report of the tranquillity and cheerfulness of the lady herself, and my love subsided in friendship and esteem.'

Such is Gibbon's story, which is also the accepted story. It is, perhaps, a palliation of its inaccuracies that, at the time when he wrote it down, he and Mademoiselle Curchod—then Madame Necker—were on such pleasant terms of friendship that neither of them cared to remember or be reminded that either had ever treated the other badly. We shall come to that matter presently; here it is proper that the inaccuracies should be noted.

CHÂTEAU DE PRANGINS

The Steps by which Joseph Buonaparte escaped in 1815

Gibbon's story, it will be observed, gives us the impression that, on getting home, he lost no time in opening his heart to his father, and, having done this, lost no further time in acquainting Mademoiselle Curchod with his father's views. M. d'Haussonville tells us that he left Lausanne in 1758, kept Mademoiselle Curchod waiting four years for a letter,[3] and then in 1762 sat down and wrote, breaking off the engagement. One shrinks from the attempt to picture the feelings of the poor girl who, after enduring suspense, and trying to frame excuses for silence, broke the seal of the long-expected missive, only to read:

'I do not know how to begin this letter. Yet begin it I must. I take up my pen, I drop it, I resume it. This commencement shows you what it is that I am about to say. Spare me the rest. Yes, Mademoiselle, I must renounce you for ever. The sentence is passed; my heart laments it; but, in the presence of my duty, every other consideration must be silent....

'My father spoke of the cruelty of deserting him, and of sending him prematurely to his grave, of the cowardice of trampling underfoot my duty to my country. I withdrew to my room and remained there for two hours. I will not attempt to picture to you my state of mind. But I left my room to tell my father that I agreed to sacrifice to him the happiness of my life.